Sunday, November 30, 2008

185 miles41.1 average miles per week27.5 hours8:58 average pace18,000 calories burned151 bpm average heart rate

The last 2 weeks have been high volume weeks which had me run 20 miles for my long run two weekends in a row. I am happy to report that the second 20 miler was easier than the first and the recovery from the second 20 miler has also been easier. I did go for a long swim the day after my 20 miler this week and I wonder if that has helped my muscles as well.

Next week is a taper week which will give my legs a chance to rest a bit (only 34 miles this week, 12 mile long run) to prepare for the upcoming high mileage weeks.

I am also working on my race schedule for 2009 and will post that soon - nothing like planning things a full year in advance!

Friday, November 21, 2008

I have always been a morning person, but waking up with a 4 on the clock 5 days a week has made me even more of a morning person (ask Doug, I often doze off on the couch before 9 pm!). Some mornings are better (read easier) than others to wake up and get going, but I am always happy when my run/swim is behind me and it really is a great start to the day. This morning I did a short run and it was fairly cold with a bit of wind as well. Since I start my runs so early it is always dark which makes for a quiet albeit sometimes lonely run. Well this morning, when the skies lightened I noticed the sun rising and had an ephiany. Not very many people watch the sunrise each day and I get to do that! There is my silver lining!

I can’t complain too much though, because for my last three mid-distance mid-week runs (9 miles each) my training buddy Mark has schlepped over to my house to run with me. I will pick a running partner over music any day of the week! It makes the run go by so.much.faster. Plus, Mark makes me do speed work which I am not great about doing on my own, so that is an added bonus. I can really see a difference in my run times as a result of doing speed work and doing more mid-distance and long distance runs.

Tomorrow is my first 20 miler warm-up for the marathon. It should give me a good indication of where I am in my training and what sort of finish time I can expect in January.

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

See title of the post and replace caterpillar with Anne ... all of this training has me hungry all. the. time. Seriously, when I am not eating food, I am thinking about food! I always love good food, but burning so many calories a day requires the consumption of more calories. I can only imagine how Michael Phelps feels having to consume 12,000 calories a day!

Friday, November 7, 2008

It has been just over a month since Longhorn and I am in the thick of Marathon training. The last three weeks I have averaged 31.7 miles per week and I am track to running 42 miles this week. Getting up really early is a drag, but for as much as I hate the loss of daylight savings because it is so dark when I get home, I love that my morning runs don't stay too dark for too long.

All of this training gives me lots of time to think about my goals for this marathon. First and foremost, the number one goal that I have when I enter any race (or start anything for that matter) is to finish. With that said, I have "just" finished two marathons already. I didn't give the distance the respect it deserved and I struggled through the last quarter of both races and ended up with times of 5:55:12 (Austin) and 5:23:09 (Maui).

See, I used to find the concept of "going long" (running long distances) to race long ridiculous. Seriously, why would anyone run 20 some off miles to run 26.2 miles? Well, that was my "just survive" mentality. I have learned to race long, you have to go long on a regular basis.

Now, there is a lot of debate in the running community on how to define long, but I define it as anything greater than 10 miles with at least several 15-20 miles runs along the way. It is all about muscle memory and teaching your body to endure. So, what does this all mean for me and my Houston Marathon goal time?

Well, based on my training I should be able to break the 4:30:00 marathon mark. If you recall I mentioned Oprah in a previous post - she ran the Marine Corp Marathon in 1994 is 4:29:20. I have to beat Oprah!

So, Goal #1 - to finishGoal #2 - beat Oprah Goal #3 - beat P Diddy, let's face it -- if the man can drink and party all the time and run a sub-4:15 marathon, I should be able to as well!

My ultimate goal (dream race, perfect conditions, etc.) would be to break 4 hours -- heck, Sarah Palin did it in 2005, but that would mean maintaining a 9:10 min/mile pace. I can do that for mid-distance runs, but my longer runs have been more in the 9:15 - 9:30 range.

So, there you have it ... my marathon goals. Note for the record that this goal is for the January stand alone marathon -- I am sure my Florida Ironman Marathon will be quite a bit slower due to cumulative fatigue.

The Florida Ironman is one year from today. I thought about this fact as I was running this morning and I tried to imagine what it would be like to hear Mike Reilly (the voice of Ironman) say, Anne Moore you are an Ironman ... I got chills!

Here is to a year of hard training - may it be fun, safe and injury free!

Sunday, November 2, 2008

Yesterday was the 2008 running of the Florida Ironman which means that registration for 2009 opened this morning at Noon. Registration sells out a full year in advance and often in minutes after registration becomes available online.

I stalked the website all morning (sometimes the link for registration goes live early) and at Noon it went live. Unfortunately, the website server was busy and it took forever for the registration page to become available. I was a nervous wreck. I finally asked Doug to try on his computer and he managed to get to the registration page ...

... and now it is official, I am registered for the 2009 Florida Ironman! Whoo hoo!

Let the training begin (well, after the Houston Marathon)!

For those of you who don't know the Ironman distances are a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike, and 26.2 miles run all done in 17 hours or less. Crap, what have I gotten myself into?!?!? :)